


Birthday Surprises

by RedChucks



Category: The Mighty Boosh (TV)
Genre: Hand Jobs, M/M, Party episode rewrite, bouncy castle times
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-16
Updated: 2019-06-16
Packaged: 2020-05-12 15:18:54
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,799
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19231750
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/RedChucks/pseuds/RedChucks
Summary: I re-wrote 'Party'. Surprise! We all know it needed fixing.Vince's POV of those party night events, the choices he makes, and what happens when he chooses a different path.Fluffy with a small side of smut.(Written for the BringingBackTheBoosh prompt: Surprises.)





	Birthday Surprises

Vince was aware that he was luckier than most. Not in any big way - he wasn’t famous or clever or particularly talented, and he never really won anything - but in lots of little ways he got lucky each day and he knew he should be grateful for that. But right at that moment he didn’t feel very lucky. Right then he was stuck in a stock cupboard with an extreme sports calendar model whilst her psychopath husband strutted around just beyond the door with a big sword and a big ego problem. It was typical of Vince’s luck. Sure, so far he’d been lucky enough to escape every adventure he’d fallen in to, but he was never lucky enough to avoid the adventure/kidnapping/horror before it actually happened and he didn’t want to end up in that sort of situation again, not when he was doing his best to actually crack the Camden scene and make it on to the cool list. And throw Howard a birthday party to remember, he couldn’t forget that. It had been the original reason for the whole scheme after all.

But his luck seemed to have completely failed him for the night, Vince mused sadly. The person he’d had his heart set on kissing didn’t seem to be taking the hint and people he had no interest in kissing were cornering him in cupboards and trying to get in to his pants just to make their husbands jealous (Vince couldn’t believe it had already happened to him twice when he’d only been at the party for an hour but life was like that sometimes, especially when you wore gold leggings and looked like a half man, half woman, half bird hybrid (Vince never did pass maths and didn’t understand fractions)).

Still, as flattering as it was, in the cupboard with an extreme sports calendar model was not where he wanted to be. He needed to escape and get his plan back on schedule. He needed to find Howard.

He tried to judge the best moment to duck out of the cupboard but managed to botch that as well and saw both Dennis the Head Shaman and Naboo turn to look at him as he escaped up the stairs, the feathers of his cloak whipping against the banisters and wall as he fled. He loved his cloak, had spent hours stitching it together, but knew he’d have to ditch it if he was going to get away from Dennis.

He was breathless and starting to panic by the time he’d handed over his cloak to Lester Corncrake and wound his way through the crowded flat to the bathroom and the skylight in the ceiling. It was his one exit but it was also a dead end. He just had to hope that his luck would kick back in and the head shaman wouldn’t search so far.

His panic flip flopped in his chest when he realised his hiding place was already occupied, and doubly so when he saw it was Howard - the person he’d been trying to impress all night, the person he’d been trying to kiss all night - but his natural defenses kicked in, just as they always did, and he found his voice settling in to the indifferent tone he’d worked so hard to perfect over the years, even though he knew it was one of the reasons Howard had never believed him when he did let his feelings slip.

“Hi,” he said said quietly, knowing that Howard most definitely didn’t want any company, let alone his, but unwilling to give up on his hiding place without a fight.

“Hi,” Howard muttered, glancing toward him before turning away, his body language confirming that he really didn’t want Vince to stay. “What are you doing here?”

For just a moment Vince considered making something up, something that would entertain Howard and make him forget his own misery, but his mind was still in too much of a panic to come up with anything and really, the truth was strange enough to make a good story and hopefully get Howard on side. Nothing snapped Howard out of a self-pitying funk like the need to protect Vince from big and intimidating men, he’d learnt that from experience.

“Head Shaman’s gone mental,” he explained, looking back over his shoulder as he clambered up through the sky light. “Thinks I got off with his wife.” He wished for a second that he wasn’t wearing such impractical boots but squashed that thought. Without the boots he wouldn’t be able to make it up to the roof ledge and it was a tricky maneuver either way. Howard must have been feeling really low to do something so unsafe, normally he didn’t take risks of any kind without creating a flow chart, a multicoloured pros and cons list, and a detailed escape plan. “He’s gonna chop my head off,” he explained as he settled in next to Howard, checking on his hair as he did so, hating the thought of what his poor barnet would look like if he ended up beheaded. “What are you doing here?”

“I’m in hiding aren’t I,” Howard snapped, stating the obvious like Vince hadn’t asked just so that Howard would be able to vent a bit. “I’m hiding from the shame, the embarrassment, that is my birthday party.”

Secretly Vince thought Howard was laying it on a bit thick. He’d known for years that Howard had a bit of a thing for being publicly embarrassed and really, he’d only mildly embarrassed himself in front of about six people, which was nothing in a crowd of at least a hundred, especially since almost no one at the party knew who Howard even was. They all only knew that it was Vince Noir’s triumphant return, his coming out in to society as their monarch, as it were, and that Howard was, well... most of them thought Howard was some sort of consort/partner/gentleman’s gentleman/modern-day renfield character. He hadn’t told Howard any of that, obviously, but it only added to his feelings of shame when he looked across at the man he’d secretly been in love with for over half of his life. Howard thought his birthday was ruined because he’d accidentally outed himself as a virgin in front of a bunch of hot women and now it was up to Vince, his best mate (who had done his best to look just like those hot women, even if Howard claimed to be oblivious to his charms) to bolster Howard’s fragile heterosexual masculinity, just like always.

“Oh, come on, Howard. It doesn’t matter that you’re a virgin,” he told him honestly. If Vince could get by as a quasi-virgin amongst Camden’s coolest, then Howard had nothing to worry about. “It’s fine. Women respect that. They don’t mind that you’ve not gone beyond the kiss.” It hurt him to say women but he knew Howard. At the beginning of the night he’d thought, foolishly, that he’d be able to maybe convince Howard that he could still consider himself a ladies man if he and Vince took their friendship further - he was the Confuser after all, not just boy or girl but something unique - but Howard’s jokes about turning gay had made him see that Howard would never take him seriously as a romantic prospect. If he was ever going to fulfill his dream of kissing Howard it would be through some sort of trick, especially since his Spin the Bottle plan had failed. But even with his heartfelt sweet talking Howard was still looking sullen and avoiding his eyes. “You’ve never kissed anyone, have you?”

Vince had already known Howard was a virgin but had assumed that somewhere along the way he’d managed to kiss someone. Even Vince had managed to snog a few people or various genders but somehow Howard had managed to live thirty-two years, and get through run-ins with Old Gregg and Eleanor, without ever being properly kissed. He tried not to seem too judgmental as he asked the question but even using his most gentle voice, Howard got immediately defensive and Vince couldn’t seem to help responding in kind.

“So?” Howard glared at him.

“Have you ever held anyone’s hand?”

It was a loaded question. Vince wanted to know whether Howard counted the times they’d held hands as significant. It wasn’t really fair, Howard had no way of knowing what those moments meant to him, the moments when Howard actually allowed Vince to be in his personal space, but Howard just shot him another angry look.

“I don’t like people touching me, okay?” Howard told him and Vince looked away, staring down at the party that had spilled out in to the street out the front of the shop. “Anyway,” Howard continued, his voice turning pompous as he defended himself. “I’ve had deeper relationships in my mind, at a distance, than you’ll ever had in your lifetime, d’you know that?”

“Are you talking about the incident with the binoculars?” Vince had always wondered about that. Why Howard made such a point of going for people so far out of his reach, staring at women through his binoculars when Vince was right there beside him, strutting about in revealing outfits, flirting as obviously as he could, trying to make himself as seen as possible. But Howard never saw him.

“That was never proved, okay,” Howard told him angrily, but Vince’s own calm was slipping. He’d wanted to make Howard feel better, because it was his birthday, but Howard wasn’t making it easy.

“It was in The Guardian,” he pointed out, hating that Howard was constantly in denial about absolutely everything.

“Look,” Howard said, with a familiar snideness entering his voice. “I don’t flit about. I don’t play the field, alright?” Vince was ready to snap back at him, remind him that he wasn’t even on the field, let alone playing it, because Howard never got picked to play, but held his tongue and was glad for it when Howard announced: “When I make that leap across the physical boundary it’ll be forever, sir.”

Vince felt a smile start to tug at his lips at that announcement. If he dared to kiss Howard, to actually make the move and convince Howard to give it a go, then Howard would be his forever. It was too tempting, but he knew it could never happen. Howard wasn’t interested, would never honestly want him, and tricking him in to a kiss would probably only ruin their friendship and Howard would either try to be with him out of some mistaken obligation, or chuck him within the first two minutes, or as soon as a pretty woman caught his eye. He would just have to try and make his peace with his pining, and possibly help find a woman for Howard. He wasn’t sure what to say next but never got a chance to think of anything because the Head Shaman chose that moment to burst through the open sky light, wielding his sword and ready to commit acts of beer fueled violence.

“Ah! There you are, you prancing kingfisher! Prepare to die!”

Vince slid across the roof toward Howard, gravitating toward him like he always did, wishing there was enough room on the roof to actually hide behind Howard as the sword was swung in his direction. At least the appearance of an alpha male threatening Vince’s safety would kick Howard’s protective streak in to gear and get Vince out of the mess he was in.

“No, look, mate. I’m not interested in your wife,” Vince told the shaman honestly. For once he had genuinely done nothing wrong and it seemed unfair that he was going to get his head cut off for it. “We were just standing in a cupboard together.”

“Just in the cupboard with an Extreme Sports Model? I don’t think so!” The Head Shaman looked deranged and beside him Vince felt Howard sit impassively, not jumping in to action or making a move to run away. His lack of a reaction was more terrifying than the giant magic man with the sword who was threatening him.

“Honestly,” Vince tried again, “I’m not interested in your wife.” He panicked then, plans were not his forte but with his luck at an all time low he needed to think of something, and allowed the words to leave his mouth before his brain had a chance to veto them. “I’m in love with someone already!” The Head Shaman didn’t seem convinced, even though Vince was still one hundred per cent telling the truth. “I’m in love with Howard!”

He’d thought that those words at least would elicit some sort of reaction but Howard’s tone was as bland as his sock collection. “Oh, yeah...” he said in an unconvincing monotone. “We’re in love.”

Vince turned to him, devastated by Howard’s attitude and the fact that when he’d finally admitted his feelings it had been met by a completely blank expression. He turned back to the Head Shaman, trying to look as believable as possible. It should have been easy, had never been a problem before, but his luck seemed to have failed completely. The bald madman was looking at him with malicious intent and his sword raised and Vince thought he might cry if he did actually get his head chopped off. He’d put so much effort in to this party, and his outfit, he couldn’t let it end like this.

“Prove it,” Dennis snarled and suddenly having his head cut off seemed like a great alternative, perfectly simple and painless compared to somehow proving that he was in love with Howard, especially when Howard seemingly had no intention of really playing along and helping him out. He’d wanted to make this night special, to find a way to give Howard an awesome birthday present, to finally unleash the molten sexual tension between them with a kiss, but his plans were in tatters along with his luck and there didn’t seem to be anything else to do!

“Fine!” he decided. “I’ll prove it!”

He lunged at Howard, hands out and sleeves flying as he grabbed his friend and kissed him. He tried to keep it clean so as not to overwhelm Howard or make him freak out and push Howard away but it was hard to keep himself in check with Howard so passively allowing him to touch him and kiss him and finally show him how he felt, to really prove it. Feeling Howard’s lips against his made him dizzy and when Howard began touching him, and actually kissing him back, he was worried he’d faint because it felt so good. He brought his hand to Howard’s cheek, placing it there gently, as if afraid Howard might vanish or pop like a soap bubble if he pushed too hard or moved too fast. Howard responded by grabbing his arm, drawing him in closer and opening his mouth, as if begging Vince to slip in his tongue. Vince resisted, he didn’t want Howard to argue later that he’d been taken advantage of, or that Vince had pushed him too far too fast. But when Howard’s tongue tentatively entered Vince’s mouth something clicked in his brain, he couldn’t hold back any more, and kissed Howard for all he was worth.

“Oh! Uh...” Vince was vaguely aware of the Head Shaman making slightly confused and disturbed noises but he no longer cared what the oversized prick thought, or what he intended to do once the kiss had ended. For now Vince just wanted to carry on touching Howard and pouring out his love with his lips and hands. He stroked his tongue over Howard’s carefully, working to give him pleasure, living for the small, desperate little noises he was making with each stroke of Vince’s tongue.

Eventually he pulled back, knowing that if he didn’t stop for at least a minute they’d end up going too far. The last thing he wanted was to fall off the roof just when they were finally getting somewhere. The bouncy castle was still being inflated and he didn’t want to land on the hard ground. That would be a terrible way to end the evening. So instead he pulled back and took a deep breath, holding on tight to Howard to keep them both steady as they took in gasping breaths.

  
“Well?” Vince turned triumphantly to the Head Shaman, unable to hide his grin. He’d finally done it, had finally shown Howard exactly how he felt.

“Going to have to go away and re-thing a few basic principles,” Dennis said quickly, sheathing his sword, his pale eyes darting about and refusing to look directly at Vince, even though he knew the creep had been watching him closely enough as he’d been kissing Howard. “Bye.”

“Bye,” Vince grinned cheerfully, relief rushing through his system at the realisation that he wasn’t about to get his head cut off. He turned back to Howard, wondering whether he could sneak in another cheeky kiss before they had to talk about feelings, but Howard had a strange look in his eyes so he backed off a bit and clasped his hands in front of him instead. “Thanks, Howard.”

Howard nodded, his eyes dazed, like they’d been the time he’d accidentally tucked in to Naboo’s ‘special’ cookies, and Vince wondered if Howard was about to chuck him before their relationship had actually started, or just straight up chuck him off the roof.

“Thank you,” Howard said breathily, so intense that Vince started to squirm and wonder if he’d made the right decision after all.

“What d’you mean?” He asked quickly, trying to smile, to tone down the intensity of the feelings between them. He’d expected Howard to be cross with him really, to tell him off for touching him, for getting his saliva and germs all over Howard’s precious moustache, for making up stories and lies and for using Howard to get out of trouble. But instead Howard was just staring at him, a grin spreading across his lips.

“Thank you, for the gift of love.”

 _‘It was just a kiss.’_ The words wanted to escape, along with the sudden urge to back away from the emotions of the moment, from the reality of what he’d done, just like he’d done every single time he’d come close to letting Howard see how he really felt. Whenever things got too real he’d always found a way to ruin the moment and duck out of it, leaving Howard confused as to what he’d done wrong, and what Vince was thinking and feeling. It had pushed a wedge between them and the more Vince tried to hide his feelings the more he just got mean and pushed Howard away. It needed to stop, he needed to stop, so he swallowed the words he’d been meaning to say and felt the air shift around him, as if he’d made some sort of choice, wandered down a different leg in the trousers of space and time - turned right instead of left. It certainly felt right.

“Come on,” Howard said to him, taking one of Vince’s small hands in his large two. “You must have felt it, Vince. A light went on in my head then. You have flipped my switch, baby.”

Vince grinned, looking at the intense emotions in Howard’s eyes. He’d seen it before, oh so many times, but he’d never allowed himself to really see it... until now. “I felt it.” He knew he needed to say more, knew that Howard appreciated words and grand declarations, but Vince was more about actions (he was a man of action in a way that Howard would never be) and there was only one thing he wanted to do right at that moment. “Come here, small eyes. Show me some more of that Moon magic.”

He let the kiss go a bit further this time, guiding Howard through the motions as they moved from closed mouth kisses and gentle stroking, to passionate twining of tongues, biting of lips, grabbing of hair and hips and thighs and Vince felt giggles bubble up in his chest because he hadn’t imagined things going this well, not with the way his luck had been over the last few years. It was too good, too good to be true, and he grabbed at Howard’s long hair and pulling him close, hard, needing more, more of Howard, more of the fire that was filling his heart, his belly, his groin!

Then suddenly Howard grabbed his waist, pulling him roughly in to his lap so that Vince moaned loud in to the night sky, and then they were falling! There was no time to try and break his fall so Vince clung to Howard instead, swearing his tits off as Howard shrieked in his ear. They hit the bouncy castle in a tangle of limbs and flowing sleeves and screams before bouncing back up in to the air, backlit by the smiling moon, flying apart from each other save for their tightly clasped hands.

“See,” Vince yelled gleefully. “Told you I got you a present!”

They landed back down on the bouncy castle with a soft thump and a smaller bounce and Vince rolled toward Howard, giddy with happiness. He’d never actually believed Howard would want him back. It just seemed so unlikely. But Howard was grinning right back at him and rolled across to take Vince in to his arms and begin kissing him again with a passion that Vince hadn’t known he had within him.

Vince slid his hand down to Howard’s ass and squeezed, letting the sound of Howard’s moan fill his ears. But beneath that glorious noise were the sounds of people moving about in the backyard, people talking, talking about the couple making out on the bouncy castle.

“Oh man! I’m not bouncing on there now!”  
“Are they having sex? That is so hot!”  
“Ew gross! Is that Vince Noir and his creepy house keeper?”  
“Well I guess the bouncy castle’s canceled. Come on, Bollo. Let’s get Fossil out of that cake before he suffocates.”

Vince didn’t break the kiss, or let either of them draw breath, until he heard the crowd leave and the only sounds in the yard were the hum of the bouncy castle motor, the shifting of the air beneath them, the rustle of corduroy against gossamer and rayon, and the desperate, exciting little noises coming from Howard’s mouth and throat. He leant back, panting, smiling so hard he didn’t care that it was probably going to give him wrinkles. He loved Howard’s smile lines and crows feet; signs of all the times he’d laughed and grinned in that dopey way he had, there was nothing wrong with lines like those, he decided, letting his joy completely overflow until he could barely keep his eyes open. But he did want to keep them open, he didn’t want to miss a moment of Howard’s face.

“Told you I got you a present,” he said softly, gesturing to the castle, his heart fluttering when Howard chuckled and looked up at him, his bottom lip red and plump from kissing.

“You could’ve wrapped it,” Howard answered, brows twitching as his eyes twinkled and Vince laughed breathily in return.

The urge to fall back on matey banter was strong but he resisted. He didn’t want to ruin this by pulling away, not this time, not when Howard was finally touching him. He wracked his brain for something appropriate to say but words had never worked for him before, where as actions had so he decided to stick with what he was good at and lowered himself carefully back down on top of Howard and kissed him gently. Howard was so eager, so desperate for what Vince was offering, and for a moment Vince worried that he was taking advantage. Howard tended to fall head over heels for whoever showed him any obvious affection, but he’d never responded to Vince’s attempts before. He wondered if he needed to slow down but then Howard’s hips bucked up in to his and he decided to hell with it. He’d waited years to get Howard beneath him and he wasn’t going to waste the opportunity.

Howard was hard, he could feel it, and so grabbed his hand and held it tight as he pushed Howard down in to the bouncy castle, kissing him more hungrily, determined now to really make this a birthday to remember. So Howard had never kissed anyone, had never held anyone’s hand, had never done anything that constituted losing his virginity, well Vince intended to rectify that, for both of them. He squeezed Howard’s hand and dragged it down so that together they could begin to rub at the bulge in Howard’s trousers. Howard whined and Vince smiled against his lips, leaning his weight on his other elbow and Howard’s chest. He figured Howard would be easy to get off; the man was so tense, so filled with pent up frustration, it wouldn’t take long.

Vince remembered his own first time getting off with another person rather than silently on his own. It had been over in minutes and he’d been imagining Howard the whole time. The guy he’d been with had been a dick about it and the experience still made Vince feel a twinge of shame but he was determined that Howard wouldn’t go through anything like that. He was going to give Howard a birthday to remember and it was going to start with a handy on a bouncy castle.

Howard was making tiny, breathy, whimpering noises by the time Vince had his flies open and Vince shivered. It was all so damned sexy and Vince pressed his own hard cock against Howard’s thigh. He wasn’t going to last long either. He took Howard’s erection in hand, feeling dizzy at how hard and large and hot it was, imaging all the fun he intended to get up to with it once they were past this initial deflowering, and began to stroke. Their kisses were messy, so far from the finessed kisses that Vince usually favoured, which were mostly for show, and so much better, even when Howard’s tongue missed it’s mark or his teeth bumped against Vince’s lip.

And when Howard’s chest began to heave and his body strained and Vince’s hand was suddenly coated in cum, Vince felt he’d never experienced anything better, and immediately followed, just like always, following Howard in to any kind of adventure, cumming in his pants like a teenager. Just when he’d thought he’d finally grown up, he thought to himself, unable to stifle the relieved, overjoyed laugh that escaped his lips.

“Thanks, Howard,” he whispered when they’d both had a chance to come down from their high, wiping his hand against Howard’s cords. They were ugly as hell anyway, a little spunk would probably improve them. Howard either didn’t notice or chose not to and instead lifted his hand to gently tuck Vince’s long, straightened hair behind his ear, an action so tender that Vince felt exposed in a way that no skin tight outfit had ever made him feel.

“Thank you,” Howard replied, his voice deep and creamy enough to make Vince’s cock twitch even though he’d only just cum. “Thank you, Vince. For the gift of love.” The urge to back track was there again, the desire to retreat in the most childish way and claim it was all just a laugh, that it hadn’t meant anything, but Vince refused to give in to those feelings. He was done with all of that. He was making his own luck and he was determined to be a grown-up about it. He still didn’t know what to say though, and it was a relief when Howard kept on talking. Howard could talk for hours and it always made Vince feel safe. “Vince...” Howard whispered, sounding surprised by what was coming out of his own mouth. “I think I might actually be gay after all.”

Vince nodded, smiling down at the slightly confused look in Howard’s shifty eyes. “It would seem so.”

“Like... a massive gayist,” Howard confirmed earnestly, and Vince saw the fear in his friend’s eyes. He wasn’t the only one making an effort to go against the flow of their lives, to change the narrative and do something new. The urge to retreat back in to their old pattern was probably pulling at Howard just as strongly, Vince figured, and he needed to say something, anything to reassure Howard that it was all okay.

“Genius, Howard,” he whispered, dipping his head to kiss Howard lovingly, smiling against his lips. “That is absolutely... genius.”


End file.
